Chronicles of the Lazy Sovereign Novel - Chapter 23

Chapter 23

“Father!”

Moon Eun-ji screamed with anger. “Even though her daughter broke in unannounced, Moon Yu-hwan received her with a calm expression, as if she had foreseen everything.

“What’s the problem?”

“Please tell that man something!”

“That man?”

“The newcomer!”

Moon Yu-hwan smiled slightly. “He seemed to refer to the eccentric man with whom he had played Go recently.

Now that I think about it, I didn’t even ask her name.

Moon Eun-ji’s face blushed as he spoke.

“He hasn’t left his room all day!”

“And how is that a failure?”

Besides eating what they bring to the room, sleep all day long! It takes seven days and seven nights since he arrived!

Moon Yu-hwan bowed his head.

“Seven days and seven nights?”

Yes! He hasn’t even washed himself! He slept seven days in a row! The bedding is practically full of mold!

Moon Yu-hwan laughed between his teeth and said:

“Then change the bedding more often.”

“Father!”

“What’s the other problem?”

Moon Eun-ji’s face twisted into frustration.

“Why do you let him get away with it?”

“What do you want me to do?”

“You have always said that laziness is sin! You have emphasized the importance of diligence. Why do you not rebuke it? Even if it is a guest, its behavior is ruining the environment. Other scholars start to murmur. If this continues, the morale of the estate will collapse!”

Moon Yu-hwan denied his head slowly.

“If the presence of a lazy man disturbs your academic activities, the fault is your lack of discipline, not the lazy man himself.”

“But Father—”

“Let it be.”

“……”

Moon Yu-hwan smiled softly.

“Eun-ji.”

Hearing his soft tone, Moon Eun-ji seemed to realize that he had overreacted and bowed his head.

“Yes, Father.”

“Do you know why Go is called a Sudam?”

[TL/N: Sudam means “talking with hands”]

“I don’t know.”

It’s called a sudam because you communicate through your hands.

“……”

Moon Yu-hwan spoke patiently, his voice full of conviction.

“I love the Go. Through it, I can understand my opponent. You can save the words, hide the expressions, but the gipung cannot be hidden. It reflects the life you have lived. [TL/N: gipung means game style]”

“Yes.”

“An impatient person cannot play quietly, nor can a quiet person enjoy aggression. Thus, the gipung reveals the nature and experiences of a person.”

“But that’s not—”

“His gipung was extremely ferocious and impatient. I had never seen such an extreme style. Therefore, I can say that he is neither lazy nor idle. He must have lived a harder life than we can imagine.”

“……”

Moon Eun-ji bit his lip. His father’s words were irrefutable; there was no room for discussion.

“The brighter the sun is, the darker the shadow. If it is now given up to laziness, it means that its past life was that exhausting. We do not chase away the birds that seek refuge from the rain, nor do we scold them for not flying in the midst of the storm. Then, can we not let it rest a little longer?”

Moon Yu-hwan’s words were impeccable wisdom, a testimony of his character.

But there was one thing he didn’t know.

While it was true that the gipung revealed one’s nature, Moon Yu-hwan had never imagined that someone would learn Go in circumstances as extreme as those of Wei Yan-ho.

Therefore, he had no way of knowing that Wei Yan-ho’s gipung was completely opposed to his true personality.

Moon Yu-hwan was seriously wrong.

“I understand.”

Though her face still showed discontent, Moon Eun-ji nodded, knowing that she could no longer argue.

‘They’re cheating on you!’

Logically, her father’s reasoning made sense, but his instinct told him otherwise. A woman’s intuition whispered to him:

That strange man who just arrived is nothing but trouble.

And her instincts were right.

If Moon Yu-hwan had correctly assessed the true nature of Wei Yan-ho, his reaction would have been completely different.

This misunderstanding was entirely due to Wei Yan-ho’s distorted gipung.

The tragedy was that Moon Yu-hwan, a man of common sense, never imagined that a human could be so lazy. If Wei Yan-ho had been moderately lazy, he might have suspected something; but the extreme laziness of his laziness made Moon Yu-hwan assume it was the consequence of a hard life.

Really, how could anyone sleep for seven days in a row?

Wei Yan-ho was just this lazy, and Moon Yu-hwan was just that reasonable: a tragic combination.

“So don’t be too hard on him.”

– Yes, Father, I say goodbye.

When Moon Eun-ji came carefully out of the room, Moon Yu-hwan laughed softly and took a book.

“Is the wind?”

Murmuring for himself, he began to read.

—

Moon Eun-ji came out with an upset expression, then clenched her teeth and headed for Wei Yan-ho’s room.

If he did not control himself, that idler would only exhaust the rice reserves of the farm. Times were already difficult; they could not afford to feed a beanie like him.

The moment she arrived, she opened the door without hesitation and entered.

“Wow!”

A smell of moisture stormed his nose.

On the bed lay a giant cocoon: Wei Yan-ho, wrapped in blankets. The view was so disgusting that it might well have been a giant slug.

How could anyone not react to such a noisy entrance?

“Wake up!”

She screamed, but Wei Yan-ho did not move. She grabbed the blanket and threw.

“Hey, you!”

He didn’t move an inch.

“Tch!”

She pulled harder, but the blanket might well have been trapped under a thousand pound rock.

Moon Eun-ji’s eyes were burning with fury.

“I said wake up!”

If the force did not work, the volume did. She cried loudly, finally getting an answer.

“What’s going on?”

A weak voice escaped the cocoon.

The sun is on your zenith!

Then talk to me after sunset.

“Get up right now!”

There’s no answer.

Moon Eun-ji gnashed her teeth.

“If you don’t get up right away, I’ll sprinkle you with cold water, and if that doesn’t work, I’ll set you on fire!”

Wei Yan-ho, imperturbable at the threat of water, shivered when he heard the word fire. The blanket loosened a little and his head looked like an egg.

“Ah, what do you want?”

“What do I want? What kind of person are you? How can you loiter seven days and seven nights in a place where others study?”

“People study because they want to. I sleep because I want to. What’s the problem?”

“You’re killing everyone’s motivation!”

“I’ve just been locked in my room. How come…”

Moon Eun-ji ran out of words.

How can someone who seems so stupid argue so well?

“That’s enough! Even if it wasn’t, I can’t stand to see you wallowing in unwashed bedding for seven days! Who do you think has to clean it? Go wash yourself right now!”

Wei Yan-ho put on a pity face.

“But I have nothing to do…”

“Now!”

He stubbornly denied his head.

“This was more than unreasonable. I didn’t expect anyone who wasn’t even family to scold him like that.”

“Can’t I stay here?”

“Then stop wasting our rice and go buy your own meals!”

Wei Yan-ho kept thinking.

Old Wei Yan-ho would have fallen asleep again without hesitation, but the current Wei Yan-ho lacked audacity.

First, I didn’t have any money.

Secondly, the meals served here were quite good.

Frankly, after years of not eating anything, anything would taste delicious.

Since he escaped from the cave, enjoying laziness and meals had been his only joys. Now, one of them was about to be snatched away.

“Puaj…”

His decision was quick.

Laziness was good, but food was not negotiable.

If he had never tried it, it would have been different, but now, the pleasure of eating was something he could never give up. His five years with Baek Mu-han had instilled in him a new vice: gluttony.

– So if I wash, okay?

“Yes!”

“And after that?”

“……”

“Can I go back to sleep?”

“No!”

Wei Yan-ho frowned.

“I have nothing else to do anyway!”

“You have to make a living! You may not realize it, but our situation is not very good. If you studied, I would understand, but we cannot afford to feed a beanie like you!”

– But your father clearly said…

“I’ll take care of the finances!”

“……”

Wei Yan-ho felt aggrieved.

But what could I say when the lady of the house spoke like that?

“So what am I supposed to do?”

“First, go wash!”

– No, let me work first, then…

“I can’t stand the smell, so wash yourself first! Do you understand me?

“Guh.”

The sharp tone of it left no room for discussion. Wei Yan-ho came out with difficulty and without saying a word.

Moon Eun-ji shook her head with disbelief.

As a daughter of Confucian teachings, she had always been careful with her words and actions, and had never raised her voice that way before anyone.

But Wei Yan-ho was different.

His laziness had the power to destroy the common sense that guided her. With only his laziness, he had made years of his disciplined upbringing useless.

“How can such a person exist?”

For Moon Eun-ji, Wei Yan-ho was the embodiment of an enigma.

With a grimace, he picked up the blanket he had been wrapped in.

“Puaj…”

Below, the footprint of his body on the bed seemed fossilized.

“How can a person…?”

She denied with her head, incredulous. While she was picking up the bedding, someone else entered the room.

“Huh?”

Outrageous, she screamed.

“Who are you?”